I hate being a fearful flier, but I have been one since 2002, roughly.

Initially, I loved flying – in fact, my first trip involved a long string of flights with Lloyd Aereo Boliviano to Montevideo, Uruguay, and I didn’t register the slightest anxiety at the botched runway approach at Santa Cruz, or the lightning flashes and turbulence from Amazonian thunderstorms.

Since then, I have developed a strong fear of flying, despite having flown a LOT. I have never gone so far as to cancel a trip due to fear, but I came awfully close once, when traveling to NYC. Ironically, it was on THAT trip that my plane was diverted to Indianapolis, due to storms at LaGuardia.

I have read a lot about the aerodynamics of flight, and understand that, just as a car gets blown around on a windy day at 70 mph, a plane gets blown around in all three dimensions while flying at 450+ mph. But all that knowledge didn’t stop me, during a flight to Argentina, from having a panic attack, and repeatedly calling on the flight attendant for reassurance that we weren’t all going to die from the plane cracking in half.

I will be working on this goal in earnest.